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gumpi
United Kingdom
546 Posts |
 Posted - May 02 2007 : 09:49:18 AM
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I submit that religion is biased in favour of thinking of God as omni-benevolent, and that it uses Satan or karma as an excuse to do immoral things. The truth is that God is perfectly good and perfectly bad at the same time.
Mystics even subscribe to the omni-benevolent idea simply because in a state of meditation, when the absolute or near-absolute state of consciousness is reached, a feeling of euphoria and other positive feelings are felt. The eastern mystics claim that it is possible to become one with God and that the reason bad things happen is because of human free will. But there are many holes in this theory.
Firstly, in order to become one with God, a situation would arise that would necessitate the existence of 2 Gods, which is logically impossible since 2 infinite beings would cancel each other out.
Secondly, it is true that free will exists - but i think the extent of our free will is grossly limited. Say 80/20% in favour of determinism. In other words, bad things happen to good people not because of a vague metaphysical doctrine of karma, but because humans are limited beings in a universe of perfectly balanced good and evil. While cause and effect is a fact, it is not a metaphysical one but a physical one.
Thirdly, reincarnation has not been objectively proven to be real. It is only a subjective experience at best. Hence i have concluded that experiences of past lives are either a) psychically tuned into etheric vibrations of the universal soul or b) the product of suggestion.
When we die, our consciousness ceases to exist in the same way we have no experience when we are deep asleep. Or in a state of samadhi.
There is not a soul in the body, but the body is in the universal soul.
Satan is the christian attempt to explain evil without involving God in it. Karma is the eastern attempt at the same thing. But just because mystical experiences FEEL good, it doesnt mean the mystic is God or omniscient etc. I contend that God created evil and good in a perfect balance and life-forms lie somewhere in the middle. |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 02 2007 : 5:24:14 PM
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gumpi wrote: quote:
"Firstly, in order to become one with God, a situation would arise that would necessitate the existence of 2 Gods, which is logically impossible since 2 infinite beings would cancel each other out."
I see no reason why there could not be two infinite beings. Maybe you are thinking of the physical concept that two things cannot occupy the same space.
Nevertheless, it is based on a false assumption, because you are assuming you would become AS God, and yet still be separate, in other words there would be two Gods.
But when you become one with God, you are no longer separate from God, and the "you" that was separate no longer exists at least for the duration. When you become "one" with God, there is only God, and nothing else exists. |
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meenarashid
76 Posts |
Posted - May 02 2007 : 6:43:39 PM
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aummmmmmm
**alchemy rather than yoga practices***
but ahhh haaaaa isnt yoga alchemy? |
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aditya
82 Posts |
Posted - May 02 2007 : 8:55:05 PM
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Read Rg Ved for your answers. To know what I am talking about, check this one for a glimpse:
http://indisch.wordpress.com/2007/0...rat-ek-khoj/
Not a perfect translation though. |
Edited by - aditya on May 02 2007 9:15:39 PM |
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Chiron
Russia
397 Posts |
Posted - May 03 2007 : 03:34:06 AM
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Satan is not a christian attempt to explain evil without involving God. Where do you think Satan came from? Who created Satan? Who created the duality of good and bad? Karma is the law of cause and effect.. it doesn't mean only bad or evil things but good things also. ALL of your life is karma, every breath and blink of the eye.
About freewill.. why did you decide to open this thread? Think about what factors influenced the event of you opening this thread. Which circumstances, which thoughts? Did you choose those circumstances? Did you have control over which thoughts came into your mind? Or were those factors created by prior factors (which were created by prior factors etc..)?
Anyway, how do you know what happens to you after you die gumpi?
Hey Ether, there cannot be two infinities because in order to have two you need a boundary to separate one from the other and if there is a boundary then both entities are limited or finite. Therefore there is only one infinite being and separation is an illusion. God is good and bad and God is beyond the duality of good and bad.
Btw, not all mystical experiences feel good, just look at the people who got burned by kundalini because they weren't ready. |
Edited by - Chiron on May 03 2007 04:59:26 AM |
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gumpi
United Kingdom
546 Posts |
Posted - May 03 2007 : 09:57:38 AM
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Thank you for clearing up a minor confusion Chiron about a split infinity. My original wording was not up to scratch.
Of course here is my analogy. You put water in a bottle and close the lid and put it in the ocean. So far, there is seperation due to the bottle. But take the lid off and the water in the bottle merges with the water of the ocean. No seperation. I wasn't arguing about becoming one with God, i was saying that the reality of being seperate from God is just the fact of "maya" and in terms of becoming LIKE God (which new age beliefs espouse ie. wishing makes it so) is a contradiction because there cannot be two infinities, or two omniscient and omnipotent beings.
I'm sorry i failed to mention free will in the OP. My take on free will is that it is something in the region of 80/20% in favour of determinism. We are very limited beings.
Yogis say that in high states of samadhi, their ego vanishes. The implication is that such a being is God. I don't accept this.
We are created beings, not the creator of the universe.
As to karma, i didn't say that karma is only bad. The only thing i said was that the doctrine of karma replaces the idea that God created evil by putting responsibility for all the bad things in the world squarely on the shoulders of humans to explain that evil. But there are many things in this life that do not fall into this idea. Take animals for example. Animals kill each other, they spread diseases etc etc. Are you telling me that human beings created that situation?
Sorry aditya, i don't understand your reference to the Rig Veda here. |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 03 2007 : 8:30:56 PM
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chiron wrote:
quote:
Hey Ether, there cannot be two infinities because in order to have two you need a boundary to separate one from the other and if there is a boundary then both entities are limited or finite. Therefore there is only one infinite being and separation is an illusion. God is good and bad and God is beyond the duality of good and bad.
Who says you need a boundary? that is the concept that makes two infinite beings impossible. What if there were two infinite beings occupying the same infinite space at the same time, both of them aware of everything? Sounds quite possible to me. |
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Chiron
Russia
397 Posts |
Posted - May 04 2007 : 02:02:05 AM
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Well if there is no boundary then how do you know there are two and not just one? What makes being #1 and what makes being #2? If you can say there is something other than infinity then that entity is not really infinity because infinity already occupies every possible bit of space and time. There can be an infinite number of beings but there is only one infinite being.
Gumpi, we are both the created and the creator and we are beyond creation... |
Edited by - Chiron on May 04 2007 03:04:29 AM |
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gumpi
United Kingdom
546 Posts |
Posted - May 04 2007 : 11:17:36 AM
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I forgot to say in my OP this - "God is perfectly evil and perfectly good."
Just thought i would clear that up.
As to being God, it is only true in the absolute state of consciousness. The trouble with this set-up is that there is no knowledge of that state, since the object merges with the subject, hence there is no perception, then no knowledge, and lastly, no experience. It is like being in a coma or being in deep sleep.
You cannot be unconscious and conscious at the same time; you cannot be asleep and awake at the same time. You are either one or the other. It is perfectly logical to conclude this. If you suddenley found yourself in a thoughtless state, the nano-second you realised that, you would think, "i am in a thoughtless state" and so you wouldnt be in a thoughtless state. You can't have it both ways - either you are consciously aware and thinking, or unconscious and non-thinking.
So saying that we are the creator is completely wrong. It is true that we have a certain amount of free will and so we can create in the same way the universe does. But we are inherently limited, nobody is omnipotent, and if they were they would have to prove they were otherwise nobody would take them seriously. |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 04 2007 : 6:09:16 PM
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chiron wrote:
quote:
Well if there is no boundary then how do you know there are two and not just one?
Because there would be two points of perception; aware of each other. |
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Chiron
Russia
397 Posts |
Posted - May 05 2007 : 7:31:26 PM
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But if a being is perceiving something other than itself then it is not an infinite being.
@Gumpi: There is a part of you that was never created and which has no limits in time or space. To feel that you need an open heart chakra. The creator manifests creation out of Herself. Separation is an illusion. It is the ego that wants to be separate. The same ego that thinks it has freewill. You should evaluate those 20% of your life you think you have power over. Meditate until you realise that all is the will of the Goddess.
I've been thinking about this topic's title and I got the feeling that Evil doesn't exist. It exists only in our perception which is based on illusion. There is nothing inherently evil in the whole of infinity. Everything has its purpose, we think its evil when we don't understand the purpose. You see someone murdered, you instantly think the murderer is evil. What you may not understand is that murder begets murder. The murdered get what they have done to others in the past while the murderer will get to learn their lesson in due time. This is how the soul matures and learns that certain actions result in certain reactions. Where's the evil in that? |
Edited by - Chiron on May 05 2007 7:46:16 PM |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 06 2007 : 09:29:52 AM
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chiron wrote:
"But if a being is perceiving something other than itself then it is not an infinite being."
If two infinite beings existed they would not perceive the other as separate from themselves.
chiron wrote:
"This is how the soul matures and learns that certain actions result in certain reactions. Where's the evil in that?"
you are mixing two different perception angles. Of course it is not evil when seen from the perspective of perfection. But where the evil exists, is in the egos that have not learned yet. How can a soul mature in knowledge if it can't distinguish between good and evil? It must learn not to do certain actions because of the consequences. The way it learns that is by classifying certain actions in a different category than others. It doesn't matter what the categories are labeled; "good and evil", or "A" and "B". |
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gumpi
United Kingdom
546 Posts |
Posted - May 06 2007 : 11:28:32 AM
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I'm sorry Chiron but i don't accept the idea of chakras or prana. As this relates to karma and evil is in the idea of samskaras, which are like impressions attached to the subtle bodies, and as i mentioned animals spread diseases and kill each other, so how can i or you be responsible for that?
There is absolutely no evidence for any subtle energy body. On the contrary, there seems to be a type of clairvoyance mixed with lucid dreaming, and in the waking state they are visions.
You have to understand that if you have experienced something similar to chakras it is because of suggestion. The subconscious has immediate effects, and these are based on the way the conscious mind holds beliefs. In fact, i suspect that the Indian chakra system is actually symbolical of deep psychological truths that have been encoded and we in the west havent decoded them properly. Otherwise, you will have to try to put forward the case that God speaks in sanskrit, since the chakras have sanskrit language in them. I find that incredibly unlikely. Another point is that there are millions of people that meditate and do not experience chakras. And yet another thing is that when the body relaxes to a significant degree, the heart rate slows which decreases the flow of blood to the brain, which similates an NDE experience, probably with a "light at the end of a tunnel". It is easy to see how that could be confused with a chakra. |
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Chiron
Russia
397 Posts |
Posted - May 07 2007 : 03:26:29 AM
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Animals spread diseases and kill each other.. and that is their karma. Every living being has its own karma stored in its own soul. Who said that you or I are responsible for what animals do? Each soul answers for its own actions.
As for chakras.. my anahata has been active for over two years. And I experience it constantly on a daily basis. That is what drives my spiritual practices. You know that feeling you have during sex? I get that in my chest, every minute, and it rarely depends on any external circumstances. Is it because of suggestion? Do you experience orgasm during sex because of suggestion? My experience is not less real. My ajnya chakra is also partially open and I often experience pleasant pressure between the eyebrows. This chakra was activated as a result of AYP practices. Is it also because of suggestion?
Anyway, the proof of reincarnation, the chakras and the subtle bodies can only come from your own spiritual practices. No-one else is going to come and prove it to you. It is either something you experience within or it is not. Doing spiritual practices, and doing them diligently over a long period of time is the only way to find out.
What did you mean when you said the chakras have sanskrit language in them? The chakras resonate to certain vibrations. That's why the sages have developed a system of vibrations (mantras) that have various spiritual effects. To find out whether sanskrit is the language of the gods you would need to purify your body and soul, awaken the kundalini, let it purify all the chakras and then travel to the astral and causal planes... I haven't done it all myself yet so I can't tell you, but I can quote the following with confidence: "Know thyself - and thou shall know all the mysteries of the gods and of the universe." |
Edited by - Chiron on May 07 2007 04:28:02 AM |
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gumpi
United Kingdom
546 Posts |
Posted - May 07 2007 : 06:53:05 AM
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I don't know that "feeling" i get during sex! If you mean orgasm, i do know that feeling but it has nothing to do with my heart.
If your experiences with chakras aren't the product of suggestion then do you have any explanation for why millions of meditators do not experience them?
I would have thought that the proof of anything supernatural obviously comes from within. The point i am making is that in terms of objective proof, there is none. I find that strange.
When i said sanskrit was in the chakras i was referring to the fact that in all the diagrams of them, sanskrit words and letters are used. Again, i find it strange that this should be the case. Language evolves according to location and every culture has different languages. Who is the authority that says that God speaks sanskrit? |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 07 2007 : 07:53:39 AM
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You shouldn't be surprised that there could be a part of reality that has no proof yet. The quest for proof is a never ending struggle that science wrestles with, and there is only a little light at the end of the tunnel as science starts to get a glimpse of some spiritual truths (mostly in sub-atomic physics).
What is the difference between a dead person and a live one? Science has been trying to identify that essence since it began, and still has nothing to go on. They want to be able to create it and put it in a bottle, or at the very least isolate it. Since the beginning of time people have tried to create life from nothing, and have not done it, and yet obviously there is something that is different between a live thing and a dead thing.
Well, prana is what this thing is. Yogis can't create it, but they can control it. Science has not grasped it yet. Science is only beginning to accept some of traditional chinese medicine now that machines can detect some of the meridians and acupuncture points. That doesn't mean they didn't exist before science discovered them.
Many people are unable to experience happiness; does that mean it is not real? And how can you tell the difference between happiness that was created by suggestion, or that which is spontaneous? What is the difference between being happy and just thinking you are happy? If meditation makes people happy and peaceful and has other benefits that can't be described in words, what difference does it make if it is caused by "suggestion" or "reality"? For instance, a depressed person thinks there is no reason for people to be happy. And for him, that is true. Who is right? |
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Blue Opal
33 Posts |
Posted - May 07 2007 : 09:14:55 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Chiron
Hey Ether, there cannot be two infinities because in order to have two you need a boundary to separate one from the other and if there is a boundary then both entities are limited or finite. Therefore there is only one infinite being and separation is an illusion. God is good and bad and God is beyond the duality of good and bad.
Hi Chiron
From a purely mathematical point of view, there can be an infinite number of infinities. The limit that a function f is said to approach at x = a when f(x) is larger than any preassigned number for all x sufficiently near a.
The real number line extends endlessly in two directions - positive infinity and negative infinity are two distinct concepts.
In a two-dimensional plane, the area above or below a certain line can extend to infinity.
The higher the number of dimensions, the larger the occurrence of infinities that do not overlap.
The value of minus infinity plus infinity is undefined in mathematics. Hence, Gumpi's theory that two infinite beings would cancel each other out cannot be proved or disproved.
Absolutely infinity cannot be defined as the set of everything that ever existed, exists, or will exist in the future. This is because:
- The set would have to include itself as an element.
- The area outside the set is undefined but does form a part of everything that exists. This creates a paradox, namely, the set of everything that ever existed, exists, or will exist does not include things that did not exist, do not exist and will never exist.
- A set that does not limit membership cannot be mathematically defined.
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 07 2007 : 10:41:57 PM
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Gumpi wrote:
"Who is the authority that says that God speaks sanskrit?"
Often subjects like that are related to sanskrit because it contains many words and concepts for spiritual truths. English is the language of science, and as you were saying, science requires proof by the scientific method for concepts to be accepted.
Spirituality doesn't lend itself well to the scientific method. The reason is that it requires repeated actions to cause repeated results that are observable by anyone. This is impossible because our status as the observer is intimately woven into every aspect of spirituality, and that skews the results, and they cannot be isolated sufficiently to be scientific.
This is similar to the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle in observing sub-atomic particles;
the observation itself changes the results.
Science has no way to qualitatively or quantitatively evaluate the spiritual pre-existing conditions in each person, and so has nowhere to begin.
In the culture Sanskrit comes from, people are used to doing yoga practices, and observing certain universally repeating results, so they have words for them. They don't try to analyze or prove them because they have experienced them and feel no need to look at them scientifically. They are just "scenery" along the path and the scenery is given names. I don't think it has anything to do with God, other than many people who observe the scenery use their devotion to God to propel them along the path.
When the bible says "in the beginning was the word" I don't believe this refers to human words. I think it means sound, or more specifically vibrations, are the beginning of creation. |
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gumpi
United Kingdom
546 Posts |
Posted - May 08 2007 : 12:28:17 PM
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What is a thoughtless state? And how do you know you are in one unless you think you are? - which would mean you were not in one...
Does the mind spew thoughts continuously or is there some experience where that stops?
I am inclined to believe that people who talk about thought-free states just BELIEVE they are there, when in fact they are not. |
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emc
2072 Posts |
Posted - May 08 2007 : 2:31:15 PM
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I once was in a discussion about science versus spirituality, and my opponent started to use Ockham's razor as an argument against sprititual explantions. (The principle states that the explanation of any phenomenon should make as few assumptions as possible, eliminating, or "shaving off," those that make no difference in the observable predictions of the explanatory hypothesis or theory. This is often paraphrased as "All things being equal, the simplest solution tends to be the best one."//Wikipedia)
I found it most amusing when I found the following on the Swedish Wikipedia:
"Ockham's razor is used wrongly in many contexts. For example, many atheists mean that God is a superfluous hypotheses to explain reality and that Gods existence can not be proved. Therefore we should accordning to the reasoning not believe in God. Interestingly, Ockham himself on that very ground rejected Anselm of Canterburys ontological god evidence. Instead he meant that we know by experience that God exists."
 Ockham rules!
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 08 2007 : 6:30:09 PM
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gumpi wrote:
"What is a thoughtless state? And how do you know you are in one unless you think you are? - which would mean you were not in one..."
Pretty weak argument. I have experienced thoughtless states hundreds of times. However, I am not in a thoughtless state at this time because I am using words.
Different states of mind occur at different times. When you are in a thoughtless state, you are MORE aware of the world around you than when you're thinking. Thinking takes you away from the real world, because words and concepts are not real; they are just pointers to real things.
In this state, you are not naming things with words, and you are not reasoning out imaginary situations with concepts. You are aware of inputs from all of your senses, and the mind can easily receive all this information without giving it words. That's how we were as a baby. |
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Blue Opal
33 Posts |
Posted - May 09 2007 : 07:39:12 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Etherfish
Pretty weak argument. I have experienced thoughtless states hundreds of times. However, I am not in a thoughtless state at this time because I am using words.
Different states of mind occur at different times. When you are in a thoughtless state, you are MORE aware of the world around you than when you're thinking. Thinking takes you away from the real world, because words and concepts are not real; they are just pointers to real things.
In this state, you are not naming things with words, and you are not reasoning out imaginary situations with concepts. You are aware of inputs from all of your senses, and the mind can easily receive all this information without giving it words. That's how we were as a baby.
Strangely enough, I have never come across a Sanskrit equivalent for the phrase "thoughtless state". Perhaps this will explain it better.
"Yogashchittavrittinirodhah" - Yoga Sutras I:2
yogah + chitta + vritti + nirodhah
yogah - yoga (is)
chitta - mind
vritti - waves, impressions, disturbances
nirodhah - to stop
The functions of the mind (chitta) include intuition, cognition, thought, perception, emotion, will, memory, imagination and awareness of being an individual. As long as you are aware that you are aware, then that is certainly a state when your chitta is still active.
The ability to stop thinking in words is merely mental gymnastics. |
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gumpi
United Kingdom
546 Posts |
Posted - May 09 2007 : 10:36:18 AM
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What is a weak argument? I never put forth an argument. I simply mentioned that when people talk of a thought-free state, i do not understand what this means. It makes absolutely no sense to me.
For example, you said that you cease thinking with words. But we don't just think with language, we think with pictures as well. So again, i do not understand what you are talking about. |
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Etherfish
USA
3615 Posts |
Posted - May 09 2007 : 11:40:18 AM
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Sorry if I misunderstood. I thought this was your argument:
"I am inclined to believe that people who talk about thought-free states just BELIEVE they are there, when in fact they are not"
Whether it is with words or with pictures, "thinking" means giving names to things and concepts and actions, then the imaginary manipulating of those names or pictures in your mind. When you feel sunlight on your face and see the light, this is not thinking. But when you say "sunlight, warm, bright light" this is thinking.
When you say "I am going to the store" you are thinking, but once the action is initiated, you can actually go to the store without thinking. Of course most people will still think, but of something else.
Being in a thoughtless state is much more peaceful, fulfilling, and "real" than a thinking state. Not to say you can live without ever thinking. just that thinking is a tool, and most people carry that tool around and use it 24 hours a day. It's like a kid who loves looking through his telescope, so he carries it around all day long. Sure it is useful, but it's better to learn when not to use it.
Not thinking is related to "being in the moment" you hear so much about. |
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david_obsidian
USA
2602 Posts |
Posted - May 09 2007 : 1:01:11 PM
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Yes. Most human minds are in a constant state of what you could call spastic thinking, all the time. Have you ever seen someone who suffers from muscular spasticity? Muscles just moving all the time -- they can't stop them. It's highly debilitating -- fortunately, there are wonderful drugs that can help many of these people.
Most human minds spend every waking minute in the mental equivalent -- constantly leaping involuntarily and ineffectively from one thought to another. Maybe, in the future, there will be wonderful drugs that can help these maybe 99% of people. Until then, a temporary cessation of spastic-thinking is known in the yoga-tradition and is called 'savikalpa samadhi'. A more permanent one is called 'nirvikalpa samadhi'. In AYP, they are called 'Inner Silence'.
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Edited by - david_obsidian on May 09 2007 1:01:28 PM |
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gumpi
United Kingdom
546 Posts |
Posted - May 09 2007 : 2:17:38 PM
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As far as i can ascertain, there are 3 types of thoughts. a) vocal thoughts. b) sub-vocal and c) pictures. There is also music, like catchy pop-tunes etc. I do not believe/think/whatever that it is possible to get rid of all of these and remain aware without them.
For example, these days i hardly ever have a). Even when i meditate a) is conspicuously absent. If this is what you mean by a thoughtless state, then i can agree. I am in this state pretty much 24 hours a day every day.
David, i believe the term "spastic" is derogatory. It is actually "spasticated". If i wasn't so sane, i would have thought you were taking the mickey.
Perhaps the thought-free state does exist, but i do not think that "bliss" is anything but a placebo effect. And i do not believe in chakras, kundalini, spiritual eye and so on. These are all the product of belief through suggestion. The argument that was presented was that science is somehow incapable of proving these things and the only way to prove them is to experience them for oneself. I already asked, "why do millions of meditators not experience them then?" to which i got no reply. A lack of objective evidence for these things is proof enough to me that they simply do not exist.
Try telling a schizophrenic that what they percieve is not real. It is the same as trying to explain here that chakras don't exist. Feeling something is true doesn't make it so.
I doubt anyone is interested, but this is my last post here. I am giving up meditating because the promised results never came and i am wasting my life.
Good luck. |
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God is perfectly evil
